Wichita eagle., 1887-07-26
MITCHEL'S RAIDERS.

from Big Snanty OH tHdt uIeHioidpiO l~lh
of April, 1862. absolutely held in their
hands the destinies of thousands OF lives and
untold millions of government treasure, for
the success of the scheme which they had
undertaken. and which then promised so
favorably, would, in all probability, have
ended the war in six months or year The
full magnitude of their responsibilities was
not fully appreciated by them until after
ward, although they had very intelligent
conception of the Importance of their mission.
Was it by mere chance, or by the special inter
position Of an overriding Providence, that
circumstances combined, in a remarkable
manner, to defeat the enterprise?
The conductor in charge of the train from
which the engine and cars were taken was
Capt. W A. Fuller, and, from my thorough
knowledge of the circumstances ana OF the
character and capabilities of the man, am
prepared to assert that If there had been any
one else in the employ OF the Western and
Atlantic road or in the southern Confederacy
in his place, the scheme would have been
successful. If the boys had reached Marietta
Thursday night instead of Friday, as they
had planned, they would have gone through
without any very serious obstacle, for on
Friday they would have had another conduc-
tor to deal with, and again they would not
have been delayed by passing the long extra
freight trains sent out from Chattanooga
loaded with army supplies in anticipation of
an attack from Gen. Mitchell, who had taken
Huntsville according to programme.
Camp Mcdonald, adjoining Big Shanty
station, was filed with conscripted soldiers,
and when Capt Fuller, while eating break
fast, was informed of what had occurred, his
first thought was that the runaways were
deserters from the camp. and would leave the
cars and take to the woods, after running out
a few miles The conscript act had but re-
Gently gone into effect and was very unpopu-
lar; desertons had been occurring daily,
and Capt F. had been especially instructed
to look out for them.
With this idea he impulsively started on
run after the departing engine, followed by
his engineer, JEFF Cain, and Anthony Muir
ply foreman of the Western and Atlantic
shops. The soldiers in camp, who had con-
gregated i'll great numbers, and sympathized
more or less with the supposed deserters,
laughed loudly in derision, and mockingly-
shouted to the prisoners:
go it, old long legs. You all i'll catch EN-,
if yer wind holds out"
At that moment the fate of the southern
Confederacy actually depended upon the
persistence of Capt. Fuller in pursuing on foot
a locomotive Fastening away from him at
full speed. 1t happened that he was trained
runner and his powers of endurance were
something wonderful. Before the war, when
the system of railroading was very imper-
feet, at one time it had been customary for
freight trains TO start out from Chattanooga
and Atlanta without knowing definitely, by
reason of delays caused by way freight, of
the precise meeting point, and small stations
were not provided with telegraph operators.
In order to prevent accident, after the vi
cinity of the supposed meeting point had
been reached, runners were sent ahead of the
trains with red flags or lanterns, and after
they met they would go to the nearest siding
and pass Fuller had been drilled as run
ner. and was capable of continuing at rapid
pace for hours in front of train He there
fore considered that only comparatively
short delay would be occasioned by running
distance of ten miles or less, where he fully
expected to find the engine abandoned and
standing upon the track.
He did not change his ideas of the situa-
ton until he reached Moons station, two
miles distant. Here he met a number of
track hands, who informed him of the num-
Der of fugitives, and also that they had taken
their tools from them and cut the telegraph
wire short distance farther on These facts
did away with the theory that they were de
serters and as he continued in pursuit very
direct conception of the plan dawned upon
him. He was a man of indomitable will and
courage, and as he began to more fully under
stand the magnitude of the undertaking he
became the more determined TO defeat it, In
this he was not only stimulated by devotion
to the southern cause, but by the dread of
severe censure from his employers and prob
able discharge.
He had learned of the capture of Hunts
vile the day before by Gen. Mitchell, and
had received notification of several extra
freight trains to be sent over the road from
Chattanooga to Atlanta conveying Confeder-
ate supplies out of reach of danger from the
enemy. In fact, the three box cars which
the boys were running off with were being
taken by him to Chattanooga for this pur-
pose. Knowing the schedules, grades, sta
tons and distances SO well, he was confident
that by using every effort he could reach
Etowah river by the time that the runaway
train would reach Kingston, at which point
they would be necessarily delayed until the
extras passed them. He hoped to reach
Etowah in time to get Old Jonah, an engine
used on a short branch leading to Cooper's
iron works.
By the time Moons was reached Cain and
Murphy We're nearly tagged out. Here
hand car, that the track hands had been
using, was secured the two exhausted men
were placed upon it, and Fuller propelled it
rapidly by running behind and pushing it,
for it had no propelling power of its own.
Occasionally Fuller would be relieved in
turn by Cain and Murphy, and thus they
made rapid progress AT one place, OF a
curve in the road, they ran off the track,
where the fugitives had torn up rail, and
Cain and Murphy went plunging headlong
into a muddy ditch, but no serious damage
was done. FILTERS hopes were realized by
finding the engine, which had come in since
the runaways passed by, and it was all fired
up ready to start back to the works After
fifteen minutes delay in getting into shape
on the main track, Fuller and his compan-
ions continued the pursuit at the wild pace of
sixty miles an hour, which was kept up until
they reached Kingston.
When the fugitives started from Big
Shanty with the stolen engine, Wilson ".
Brown acted as engineer, William Knight
assistant, ard Alfred Wilson as fireman;
Andrews was also there in full command.
Knight first pulled the throttle, and for
several miles, after first stopping at Moons
station, TO cut the wire and obtain TOOLS they
put the engine to its utmost speed. They
then stopped TO fire up, for the steam having
been allowed TO run down in anticipation of
L ar